New From Silver Shadow: Gilboa Snake Double-Barreled AR-15

thefirearmblog.com reports Silver Shadow has officially unveiled its Gilboa Snake double-barreled AR-15. That’s some heavy shit. “The rifle, with its two 9.5″ barrels, weighs 9.4 lbs.” Double your pleasure, double your fun? I guess. Why would you want to throw two rounds down range with every trigger pull, complicating the whole reloading and mechanical side of running a mission critical firearm (aren’t they all?). The Silver Shadow knows! “The features of the Gilboa™ Snake enable operators to accurately deliver two rounds into a target without the delay of cycling and the felt recoil which make ‘double taps’ difficult to group. The Gilboa™ Snake will allow faster traversing between multiple targets by delivering two rounds with each trigger pull.” Huh. Anyway, I can see where the Snake in full auto mode would add more than a soupçon of suppressive fire. Where do I get mine?

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If I remember correctly the full auto registry ban of 1986 dictates any weapons built after said date that fire more than one round per trigger pull as illegal for civilian ownership. By that, they would have to put in two triggers that you would have to pull to make it civilian legal.

You can own “anything you like” that is NFA Class 3/Title II, but there is a cutoff – thanks to the Hughes Amendment to a 1986 bill, we’ve got a cutoff of 19APR1986 as a manufacture date for many privately-transferable NFA firearms.

Blame New Jersey.

If it’s made BEFORE 19AAPR1986, it may be transferred “freely” between individuals, with the blessings of F Troop and CLEO. 19APR1986 or later? LE/DoD only.

Got it right in a round about way. I believe the manufacturer claims that the civi version will have 2 triggers by their design (maybe to get around a BATFE rule for one round down range per trigger pull) and L.E./military only have one to squeeze for more joy!

Since the shockwave spreads behind the projectile, there should be no interference so long as both rounds leave at the exact same time and at the exact same velocity. That is not likely. Also, in the unlikely event that the rounds do leave in such a condition, the moment they go subsonic each projectile’s shockwave will catch up. Not a problem for the projectile producing said shockwave, as the wave will me more-or-less centered on him. Huge problem for his brother next to him, though.

Big gun ships, battleships at least and maybe some heavy cruisers, had firing delays for center guns so the shock waves wouldn’t interfere and knock the outer shells away. I have reference books at home, I could find it if I remember. Google might say something about it. Muzzle velocity on the Iowa class 16″ rifles is 2700 fps or so, and memory says salvo dispersion was cut from 600 yards at long range to under 200 yards. If they can get interference from shells 5 feet (a guess) apart, I’d guess rifle rounds just an inch apart would interfere even more so.

Right. And the delay was necessary because it was (and is) impossible to guarantee that all rounds leaving the barrels have the exact same velocity. Couldn’t do it with the big 16’s, and you sure as hell can’t do it with 5.56.

In addition to the shock wave behind the bullet (tail shock) which is relatively confined to a column behind the bullet, there is a compression in front of the projectile which creates a shock wave which then emanates out from the tip in a conical fan like fashion, (termed bow shock). The bow shock of two supersonic projectiles right next to each other probable would interact. I think it would create extremely unequal pressure distributions on either side of the bullets. I don’t think the shock wave catching up is a big issue because it probably attenuates with at least the square of distance, if not the cube depending on how omnidirectional it is and the bullet is still going pretty fast at that point.

That doesn’t make any sense. The buffer tube is absolutely necessary as it contains the recoil spring which pushes the bolt carrier group back into battery after a shot is made.

The ‘piston’ you’re referring to replaces the direct impingement gas system which unlocks the bolt carrier and pushes it back into the buffer tube, where the recoil spring & buffer push it back into position.

Some piston-driven ARs like the Para-Ord TTR do away with the buffer tube in favor of a recoil spring around the operating rod. The AR-18 (son of AR-15, or half-brother or whatever) does this as well. The buffer tube is not NECESSARY, you can always run a recoil spring another way.

OTOH, if you want to bump-fire the heck out of this thing with a SlideFire stock, you do need the buffer tube. I’m sure that would aid with accuracy, two mis-timed recoil impulses bouncing around on your shoulder. :eyeroll:

At the range this thing is likely accurate for double-fire, a shotgun will put 8 bigger pellets on target more reliably.

You should have included the other photos The Firearm Blog has, it is ridiculous, they demo it with dual lasers, or dual flashlights. Personally I think they should have demoed it with the Doublemint twins in bikinis, you could pay them with breast implants so they have double Ds.

Assuming it has a tuning fork shaped single bolt carrier, I wonder what kind of horrible things would happen to the bolt carrier if you used different brands of ammo in each magazine. Even if it is the same brand, I wonder if the two bullets have a chance of striking each other in flight due to nutation?

I suspect you could find the average and std-d of the pressures produced by various rounds and figure the number of cycles-to-failure. Something similar to a bearing calc comes to mind. I guess I was just focused on the more immediate issue (IMO) of hitting what you’re aiming at.

For something as silly as this, you think they could have spent the time and effort in to developing a duplex cartridge that works well. For every good idea the Israelis come up with like the Tavor or Uzi, it seems they go out of their way to ruin their reputation with things like this or the Desert Eagle.

Even if this weren’t a prohibited post-86 machine gun, it’s still dumber than fungus for so many reasons. Regulating two barrels to hit to the same POI is extremely difficult (and expensive) even if you’re got the insoluble shock wave and ammo variability problems solved. Which you never will.

Another video game ‘proof of concept’ that will never fire a bullet (or a pair of bullets) in anger. Fun, but ridiculous, like the world’s first fuel-cell powered hovercraft lawn mover.

“Fun, but ridiculous, like the world’s first fuel-cell powered hovercraft lawn mower.”(FTFY NC)
Crap. That was to be my next invention! I guess I will have to develop the anti-gravity recliner first then.

I’m seeing comments on the shock waves disturbing the bullets’ flight as if this was an elite sniper weapon. With barrels only 9 1/2″ long, I think that this is more of a 50-75 yard gun to give double taps on bad guys when the SHTF.

I agree with bontai Joe. Clearly this gun isn’t designed for long rang precision. Like most SBR’s this weapon is most likely designed, much like the corner shot, for a special purpose. Being former infantry I can see where this weapon would be useful in an urban opperation. When dismounting vehicles and clearing buildings worrying about the roids dropping sub sonic is not an issue. When your farthest shot is most likely within 50 yards this weapon could be quite effective. IF and only if they perfected the design of the bolt carier group. Now im not advocating every member of your fire team be carying one but it could have its uses.